We are hard at work on Pikes Peak Writers Conference 2019.
The dates: May 3-5, 2019
Stay tuned to this page for the latest updates.
Workshop Title: Act Like a WriterFacilitator: Maberry, Jonathan
Description: This is one of my hottest workshops. Writers are often uncomfortable with public appearances and yet they need to become the face of their book and the face of their brand. This program discusses how to feel comfortable when meeting the public (at signings, etc.), how to do a compelling reading, how to give a talk (without notes), and how to construct a ‘public version’ of you.
Workshop Title: Adrenalin Rush: Writing Suspense Fiction
Facilitator: Gilstrap, John
Description: Award-winning thriller author John Gilstrap presents a three-hour seminar on the construction of intelligent suspense fiction. What makes for a strong plot? How do you take cardboard characters and give them life on the page? Through lively lectures and writing exercises, students get a peek at the skeleton that gives structure to the stories that keep us reading long into the night.
Workshop Title: Art of the Pitch
Facilitator: Maberry, Jonathan
Description: This would be business-focused. Topics covered would include writing the synopsis; Query letters; face-to-face pitches; the ‘elevator pitch’; identifying your market, reader demographic, and genre; building submission materials; formatting the manuscript; searching for markets; etiquette; follow-ups; and other resources.
Workshop Title: Ask a Psychologist
Facilitator: Dias, Jason
Description: Psychology and psychologists appear in fiction frequently. It’s easy to get them wrong, but help is here. In this Q&A session, Dr. Dias answers all your questions about psychology. Diagnostics, behavior, stereotypes, whatever you want.
Workshop Title: Audiobooks 101
Facilitator: Murphy, Sandra
Description: Did you know that the highest growing segment of publishing is audiobooks? Creating an audiobook is not intimidating once you know the basics. This workshop will cover top audiobook trends, writing with speaking in mind, hiring a compelling narrator, ACX, and best practices. We’ll discuss all the details needed to help you give your book a voice and secure more lifetime fans of your work.
Workshop Title: Audiobooks 201
Facilitator: Murphy, Sandra
Description: This class delves into the nitty-gritty of audiobook production. We’ll get a behind the scenes look into production to understand what it takes to make a top shelf product. Then it’s on to discussing contracts and distribution sources so you can make an informed decision on the best contract for your book. Heck, you can just come for the marketing tips for audiobooks we’ll go over at the end.
Workshop Title: Bangs and Booms: Technical Stuff Writers Get Wrong
Facilitator: Gilstrap, John
Description: Fiction readers are getting more sophisticated all the time, and it’s a writer’s job to get the details correct. New York Times bestselling author John Gilstrap brings his thirty years of experience as a firefighter, EMT, explosives safety expert and hazardous materials specialist to the classroom in a lively, interactive session to teach the basics of projectile ballistics and explosives. What actually happens when a person gets shot or stabbed? Do silencers really work? What’s the difference between a fire, a deflagration and a detonation? These and many other questions will be answered. Note: This presentation contains graphic imagery.
Workshop Title: Beating Writer’s Block
Facilitator: Litore, Stant
Description: We use the term “writer’s block” to refer to quite a few different scenarios. Come learn about each and how to get through, over, or around it—whether you’re the “perfectionist” whose internal editor blocks you before you start, or the “artist” in the middle of the draft appalled at the distance between what you’ve envisioned and what you’ve created, or the “one who waits” for that magical someday when you’ll have all the time, or any of a number of others. Come pick up some strategies for smashing “writer’s block.”
Workshop Title: Becoming a Narrative Pro
Facilitator: Storme, Sarah
Description: Is your manuscript going unnoticed? Perhaps it’s time to focus on your narrative. We’ll review passages from popular fiction and talk about tightening your writing, giving it flavor, and checking the point of view. You’ll leave a narrative pro!
Workshop Title: Blockbusters – Top 8 Essential Elements to Grand Stage Stories
Facilitator: Grant, Dan
Description: Every big idea, grand-stage story contains common elements that makes the drama and plight of the character stand out. What are those key concepts? There’s 4 Cs: concept, character, conflict, and crucibles; along with necessities of goals and motivation for the characters.
Workshop Title: Build Your Own New Media Empire
Facilitator: Cartwright, Trai
Description: Movies are forever and TV is golden, but the real action is in the digital realm — and it’s so easy to break in! You’ve got lots to say, so say it with a web series or a podcast, short bursts of storytelling, education, or inspiration. Learn the basic principals of content development for these mediums, and better yet, learn how to launch your own New Media Empire…for very little money or experience! Everyone has a short-form storytelling concept in them — learn how to make the most of yours.
Workshop Title: Building a Better Monster
Facilitator: Maberry, Jonathan
Description: There are thousands of monsters in myth, legend and folklore that would scare Dracula and send the Wolfman running with tail between his legs. NY Times bestseller Jonathan Maberry has built a career out of using these old-world monsters to scare his audience –as seen in his new Netflix series, V-Wars, based on his best-selling and genre-bending vampire books. This lively workshop discusses dark and deeply weird variations of classic monster tropes, research for blurring reality and fantasy, techniques for character and scene construction that amps up the chills, and much more.
Workshop Title: Career Planning for Writers
Facilitator: Bradley, Fleur
Description: This workshop will show you what you can realistically expect to get paid, where to find paying work, and how to build a career as a (freelance) writer, editor, or speaker. Join freelance writer and editor Fleur Bradley and learn to set goals, create realistic timelines to achieve them, and avoid pitfalls.
Workshop Title: Creating Unforgettable Civilizations
Facilitator: Litore, Stant
Description: Creating an imaginary world is not an academic exercise separate from character and plot. The world you write and the culture inhabiting it places specific pressures on your characters and creates opportunities for plot. This is the case whether the culture you’re creating is a single family or an entire civilization. Come to this session for fresh strategies and ideas for how your fictional culture’s idea of home, its tech (or magic), its religion, and even its names for things can make your story come alive in new ways.
Workshop Title: Customizing Scrivener: Advanced Techniques for the Motivated Writer
Facilitator: Allen, Debbie
Description: In this workshop, writers already familiar with the basics of Scrivener will discover the many ways Scrivener can be configured for novels and non-fiction projects. Find out how to customize Scrivener to your particular needs and take advantage of little-known elements to make your writing life easier to manage. Learn to plot your book with virtual index cards, how to manage scenes (and your own motivation) with the outliner, and how to fly through revisions with features most Scrivener users have not yet discovered.
Workshop Title: Deeper Than Skin
Facilitator: Roland, Veronica (Calisto)
Description: Diversity is more than changing a person’s skin color or gender. The challenges people encounter in a culture are influenced by what they area as much as it is by who they are. This session will delve into the deeper interactions people have with the majority along the basis of Race, Gender, and Sexuality.
Workshop Title: Demystifying EPUBs: It’s not Just Clicking a Button
Facilitator: Carlson, Eric
Description: EPUBs are mysterious beasts, and few writers (and surprisingly few book designers) understand how they differ from print books. This presentation aims to demystify what an EPUB is and how you, as a writer and perhaps self-publishing author, can create better and more beautiful EPUBs.
Workshop Title: DIY Guide to Top 10 Editor Fixes
Facilitator: Catts, Margo
Description: As an editor and writer, I promise you cannot edit yourself. But you CAN find and fix some of the most common problems that get in the way of someone falling in love with your book. Learn to identify and eliminate fatal manuscript flaws so that you can show the world (or your potential editor or agent) your very best work.
Workshop Title: Don’t Fall Down the Rabbit Hole of Research
Facilitator: Evans, Jason
Description: Join me as we begin a journey on researching and writing. I’ll answer some common questions you’ve probably had, as well as some questions it didn’t occur to you to ask. Questions like . . . How accurate does this story have to be? Where do I start my research? How tightly must my story follow the timeline? Where can I research certain minutia? Don’t worry! It’s not as daunting as you think.
Workshop Title: Editorial Throwdown
Facilitator: Martin, Tiffany Yates with Faith Black Ross
Description: Two professional editors offer “live edits” on pages of attendees’ WIPs so authors can get valuable feedback from editors who work on hundreds of published manuscripts every year, and see firsthand how different editors have different styles, approaches, and sometimes opinions. A great way to get a sense of what the editing process is like, and how to know how to evaluate it and determine what works for you and your story. Please bring three copies of one page from your WIP for evaluation (double-spaced, 12-point font).
Workshop Title: Electrifying Emotion: Description to Grab Your Readers
Facilitator: Perischetti, James with David Slayton
Description: One of the leading causes for a book to get rejected—by agents, editors, or readers—is a lack of emotional connection. But emotion is one of the hardest balances to strike in your prose. Too blunt and it feels heavy-handed. Too subtle and you’ve lost your connection with your reader. Learn techniques for bringing out the emotion in your book, and the different levels of tying character emotion to description.
Workshop Title: Excuse Me, Ma’am? Would You Like Your Bodice Ripped?
Facilitator: McCune, Bonnie
Description: Contemporary writing and out-of-date stereotypes. Whether it’s the idea that small town life is better than big city, or men and women prefer clear gender roles, or the scarcity of diverse ethnicities in characters, what do we lose by these self-imposed limits? Are they good or bad? Are they unavoidable? Where do issues like #metoo fit in? What’s the difference among stereotypes, tropes, symbols, personifications, and clichés? How do I handle these topics in my work?
Workshop Title: Fight or Flight: Feeding on Your Character’s Fears
Facilitator: Catts, Margo
Description: When you describe your characters’ motivations, you probably list their desires—love, wealth, success, power. But under all that is something more primal: fear. Learn how to identify and mine your characters’ fears for richer, more complex character development, and plot turns that may surprise you.
Workshop Title: Getting it Edited
Facilitator: Martin, Tiffany Yates
Description: I address the concerns, pitfalls, and offer a specific checklist to use in finding your perfect editor; resources for finding the best in the business and your perfect fit; and red flags to watch out for.
Workshop Title: Giving Voice to the People in Your Head
Facilitator: Storme, Sarah
Description: How do you make your dialog special? How do you give each character a unique voice? And how do you develop the characters, define time and setting, and advance the plot through dialog? In this workshop, we’ll find the answers together.
Workshop Title: HA: Humorists Anonymous and 12 Steps to Embracing Your Funny
Facilitator: Rowley, Rebecca
Description: Whether you are thinking about adding humor to your current writing genre or breaking out into a new world of comedy, this twelve-step program will teach you how to embrace your humor, show it to the world, and develop your own comic voice. With each step participants will be given a quick exercise or response to perform in class. While no one will have to stand up in front of the class, participants should be prepared to at least recite the pledge to comedy aloud with other attendees.
Workshop Title: Habits of the Professional Writer
Facilitator: Fahnestock, Todd and Mandeville, Chris
Description: Learn from the journey of two full-time writers who created a “co-worker” relationship that addresses many of the day-to-day challenges of a career author.
Workshop Title: Hey, You Don’t Look Tense
Facilitator: Martin, Tiffany Yates
Description: In this deep-dive exploration into tension and suspense, learn why a lack of these concepts may be what’s keeping you from that contract or bestseller list; how to identify where your manuscript may let them lag; how to instill tension into every single scene and page; what “lizard-brain writing” is and how to use it to amp up tension and raise stakes, develop character, and further plot; and more.
Workshop Title: How to Market Your Book on Amazon
Facilitator: Letofsky, Polly
Description: “Amazon is your most powerful marketing partner. In this class we’re going to share all the tips and tricks you can use to boost your sales and findability on Amazon:
• The anatomy of Amazon – Don’t miss a single free marketing tool! • How to select your most effective browse categories • Tools to optimize your Author Central Account ” Workshop Title: How to Write Compelling Villains
Facilitator: Evans, Jason
Description: How do we right memorable villains? Villains that steal the thunder from your protagonist, that make the reader sympathize with them. Villains that make wearing black look really cool. We will go over main villains, henchmen, villainous organizations, and the villainous world view. We’ll cover the difference between a villain and an antagonist. When we’re done, you will wear the black hat and LOVE it!
Workshop Title: I Can See it Now: Storyboarding Your Novel
Facilitator: Merritt, Kendra
Description: Storyboarding can help you visualize your story from a bird’s eye view and let you spot problems like plot holes and pacing at a higher level. In this workshop we’ll go over techniques you can use to layout your novel before you write, while you write, or after you write. You’ll learn how to scale these methods up or down depending on the length of your project and the size of your problems, whether you need to make a tweak to a short story or restructure an epic novel.
Workshop Title: I Got a “Send it!” Now What?
Facilitator: Mandeville, Chris
Description: This workshop is intended to provide support and answer questions for those conference attendees who have been asked to send their manuscripts to an editor or agent. It includes an overview of all aspects of a submission, from the cover letter to the dreaded synopsis, as well as manuscript formatting standards and editing guidelines. Attendees leave armed with a comprehensive checklist of items to address before sending out their submissions.
Workshop Title: Is Your Manuscript a Pinto or a Porsche: The Nuts and Bolts of Great Writing
Facilitator: Carpenter, Jami
Description: Whether your manuscript is fiction, non-fiction, memoir, or mystery, the goal is the same: to use words for maximum impact and write a great story. Using years of experience working with authors and publishers, Jami offers examples to enhance your writing. From creating first sentence/first page hooks to avoiding common mistakes, the emphasis will be on the craft of writing.
Workshop Title: Just the FAQs Ma’am: Copyright Demystified
Facilitator: Speer, Brenda
Description: Copyrights are critical to the creative industries, yet are often little understood or misunderstood by creatives. The session will educate participants on US copyright law and its applicability to their creative endeavors. Learning objectives are for participants to understand what copyrights are and how they apply to works participants create, as well as to the works of others. The session will inform participants how to protect and commercially exploit their creative assets during their lifetime and beyond.
Workshop Title: Language of Bigotry
Facilitator: Roland, Veronica (Calisto)
Description: Expletives and derogatory terms are the easily recognizable ways bigotry is broadcast in society. The evolution of these among certain groups and pattern of speech are the more insidious methods by which people delineate who is worthy or not. This session explores terms unique to racism, sexism, ableism, and queerphobia.
Workshop Title: Legal Issues in Worldbuilding: Using Facts in Fiction or Nonfiction
Facilitator: Speer, Brenda
Description: How often have we heard ‘art imitates life’? Or as creatives been told to ‘create what we know’? It’s no wonder then that in the creative process, not only is it true that ‘we are what we create’, but also that ‘what we create we are’. Because of ‘what we are’, authors often include real world information in writing fiction and nonfiction. The session will address how permissibly to include real world information in writing.
Workshop Title: Masterful Metaphors and Similes
Facilitator: Craft, Rachel Delaney
Description: In this class, we’ll use examples from published works to learn what makes a comparison succeed (or fail) and how to elevate your metaphors by incorporating character, emotion, and foreshadowing. We’ll also discuss how to avoid cliches and where to find ideas for fresh, inspired metaphors and similes. Attendees are invited to bring their own for workshopping.
Workshop Title: Mind the Gaps: See What Can’t-Put-Down Stories in Any Genre Do Best
Facilitator: Catts, Margo
Description: A story outline tends to hit the high points and leave the details pretty thin in between. But while you may have your eye on those high points, your readers need you to carry them across the gaps in a way that makes them develop relationships with your characters and feel compelled to see where the story is going. In this class we’ll deconstruct successful examples and works in progress to learn how to identify and provide the information essential to carrying the narrative forward without bogging it down.
Workshop Title: Moonstruck and Minor Characters
Facilitator: Skaggs, Cindy
Description: This workshop will discuss the how/why of creating realistic minor characters who enrich your stories and give depth to your character and your fictional world. Using examples from Moonstruck, we’ll learn that minor characters should not exist in a vacuum, but rather they should behave as if they have a full, rich life outside the pages of the scene/book.
Workshop Title: Myths, Ghosts, and Gods: The Divine in Fantasy
Facilitator: Berg, Carol
Description: Do you have to? How to avoid “gods and goddesses 101”. Considerations: what’s real and what’s not; what do characters believe and are they right?; avoiding heavy-handedness; religion vs ritual vs spirituality vs belief.
Workshop Title: Networking & Public Speaking for Authors
Facilitator: Gilstrap, John
Description: Publishing is a people business. Gone are the days (if they ever really existed) when writers could seal themselves in a room with their imaginations and make a living without interacting face-to-face with people. In this presentation, John Gilstrap will offer up some fool-proof tips and tricks that will take some of the edge off the terror of talking to strangers.
Workshop Title: Nightmare on Editor Street
Facilitator: Carpenter, Jami
Description: Even the most accomplished writers struggle with spelling, grammar, and punctuation; suffer from misuse or abuse of the language; rely on favorite phrases and wallow in pet words. Jami reveals common, ghastly, and humorous errors and offers suggestions to help writers become a publisher’s “dream come true.”
Workshop Title: Order From Chaos: Paragraph, Scene, and Story Arc
Facilitator: Berg, Carol
Description: What’s the difference between these? How do they serve the story? How do they work together. (Structuring for tension/pacing/logical connection.) The essentials of a story arc (a character, a point of view, a time and place, a plot “destination”.)
Workshop Title: Outlining Your Novel Using Plot Points
Facilitator: Bradley, Fleur
Description: A novel outline is a lot like a road trip: you want to know where you’re going, but leave time for unexpected stops and surprises. Plotting with plot points gives you plenty of room to be creative, while still keeping your novel structured. Author Fleur Bradley will show you in action how to take a logline/concept and characters, and build to a strong outline, while still leaving pantsers plenty of room to color outside the lines.
Workshop Title: Plot Your Novel Using Conflict Streams
Facilitator: Craft, Rachel Delaney
Description: Conflict is the engine of story. The best novels have several sources of conflict, continually escalating and interacting with each other from page one through the climax. Learn how to identify the streams of conflict in your novel, maximize each one, and plot them together for a novel that can’t be put down.
Workshop Title: Plotting Your Character’s Demise: The Purpose Driven Death
Facilitator: Perischetti, James
Description: There are hundreds of ways to kill a character, but there’s usually just one PERFECT way for them to meet their demise. Looking at plot and character arcs, this course will identify several categories of death in fiction to help you find the one that will have the greatest impact in your story.
Workshop Title: Practical, Actionable Editing Tips and Tricks (or How to Climb Revision Mountain)
Facilitator: Martin, Tiffany Yates
Description: This detailed overview on how to edit offers concrete, practical techniques for approaching a revision. Based on more than twenty-five years of working closely with authors as an editor, I’ve developed a playbook of techniques to help authors approach story revisions—even huge ones—in a manageable way that yields clear results for their stories. A left-brain approach to right-brain creativity, this workshop offers even the least analytical writer the tools she needs to tackle the toughest of edits and hone manuscripts into tight, polished shape with practical steps for approaching revisions, and helpful tips, tricks, and tools (like X-rays, arcs, and ladders).
Workshop Title: Publishing 101
Facilitator: Letofsky, Polly
Description: With this fast-changing industry join us in Publishing 101 to learn your options in publishing, the pros and cons to each, what costs to expect, and what you should never put up with.
Workshop Title: Punched Up Pitches
Facilitator: Slayton, David
Description: Whether you’re an indie author writing your own cover copy or a traditional author querying agents, you’ll need a pitch to entice and excite readers. This workshop will show you some techniques for punching up your query’s stakes. We’ll look at query letters that worked and workshop your pitch. Please bring your query or pitch.
Workshop Title: Rethink Your Tools: Choosing, Using, and Customizing Your Writing Software
Facilitator: Carlson, Eric
Description: As writers we are much too willing to use the tools we are given, without thinking about how we might better use or customize them to create our own optimal writing environments. This presentation looks at the boundary between content and form—between writing and design—and explores often overlooked alternatives to our ‘out of the box’ use of word processors.
Workshop Title: Rock Your Reader Magnet: Build Your Fan Base the Easy Way
Facilitator: Allen, Debbie
Description: Most authors know that growing your followers with a free giveaway makes great sense. But what do you offer? This workshop offers a slew of enticing options (for both fiction and nonfiction authors) with items that will have readers jumping on to your newsletter list. We’ll cover what to offer, easy ways to format your giveaway, and how to easily deliver your freebie. Your list will grow in no time, and that means a built-in audience to buy your books.
Workshop Title: Ruins and Relics: The Bones of Your World
Facilitator: Litore, Stant
Description: Even as your body carries the marks of your history—scars of past injuries or tattoos that tell parts of your story to yourself—so the world your characters inhabit carries marks of the past, each of which has a story. This applies whether the world of your story is a single room, a crime scene, a city, a galactic empire, or an epic fantasy world. Come find out what you can discover as a storyteller (and what you can uncover for the reader) using ruins, relics, and other marks of the past.
Workshop Title: Runes for Writers: Ancient Sources for Modern Storytellers
Facilitator: Graham, Marc
Description: This workshop provides a practical application of the ancient runes (Elder Futhark) for today’s writer. Used for centuries by Norse skalds as tools of divination, the runes serve modern storytellers as an aid to bypass the left brain and get directly in touch with the right brain’s center of creativity. Similar to the Tarot, each rune has its own esoteric meaning. When shuffled and cast into a particular array, the runes help the writer tap into the subconscious for ideas and to solve character and story-development challenges. The workshop will include runecastings for audience participation and practice.
Workshop Title: Screenwriting Exposed!
Facilitator: Mitchell, Saundra
Description: Creation, examination and adaptation! During this workshop, the aspiring screenwriter will learn about proper screenwriting format, screenwriting software, and how to adapt existing materials for the small and large screen. Laptops and adaptation material are strongly encouraged; this will be a hands-on writing experience!
Workshop Title: Scrivener for PC Users: Tips, Tricks, and Customization
Facilitator: Allen, Debbie
Description: Scrivener software is an increasingly popular tool for writers, yet there’s a steep learning curve. And because it was created first for Mac users, writers using PC can be left feeling adrift. This workshop will familiarize you with Scrivener, and help you grasp the program’s amazing features–on PC terms. Learn to navigate the software, import your manuscript and every last scrap of research, plus how to take advantage of Scrivener’s most helpful (and often unknown) features.
Workshop Title: Scrivener from Zero to 60: Get Up and Running–and Writing–with Scrivener TODAY
Facilitator: Allen, Debbie
Description: Scrivener writing software: everyone says they love it, but what writer has time to learn something new? And most writers using Scrivener miss out on some of the program’s best elements. This workshop will help you start, literally, at zero, and get up and running right away. Even long-time users will learn to take advantage of features they didn’t know were there. Learn to navigate stunning elements to make writing–and research–faster and more efficient, no matter what genre. This workshop is for both fiction and non-fiction writers. Bring your computer with Scrivener already downloaded (you can try it free for 30 days).
Workshop Title: Sex, Gender, and Sexuality
Facilitator: Roland, Veronica (Calisto)
Description: As our culture embraces the spectrums of previously overlooked spectra of diversity, the language describing sex, gender, and sexuality evolves. To be able to include these diversities, we need to understand the language thereof. This presentation will explain the definitions, similarities, differences, relationships, and complications between sex, gender and sexuality.
Workshop Title: Space Warfare (?)
Facilitator: McNelis, Patrick
Description: truth about combat in space
Workshop Title: Starting your Story in the Right Place
Facilitator: Perischetti, James with David Slayton
Description: One of the most challenging goals in commercial fiction is knowing what to include and what to exclude in a first chapter. In this craft-oriented workshop we’ll focus on examples that strike the right balance between exposition and action (in medias res).
Workshop Title: Suspense Elements the Translate to Every Genre
Facilitator: Goff, Chris
Description: Regardless of genre, conflict is the core of a story. It’s what motivates your character, drives the action and keeps your readers turning the pages. In this session we’ll explore different suspense elements and techniques that you can employ to add conflict, elevate stakes and amp up the tension in every novel. We’ll start with some basics, then time permitting explore ways you can implement the techniques into your own work.
Workshop Title: Synopsis Made Simple
Facilitator: Mandeville, Chris
Description: Writing a synopsis can be daunting, but the process can be made much simpler by following a few key principles: know your audience, know the expectations, follow a guide, and enlist help. This workshop covers these principles, providing examples and illustrative anecdotes to demonstrate each.
Workshop Title: Systems Thinking for Writers
Facilitator: Courtney, Deb
Description: You don’t go to work and stare at a screen and thing “Well I’m just not feeling the muse today, I think I’ll clean the refrigerator,” do you? Of course not — you would not have that job for long. But we often approach our creativity this way. With Systems Thinking, we no longer have to. Systems Thinking offers a significantly different approach to creativity, writing, and completing creative works. This session frames the creative process as part of a system, with process, and steps, and tasks, and enables a shift in thinking from struggling to make art to defining your creative process and knowing just how to finish a project.
Workshop Title: Taking Back Time: Time Management
Facilitator: Merritt, Kendra
Description: How do you find the time to practice your craft and actually get those ideas on paper when you work a full time day job or you’re a stay at home mom? Paying the bills and changing diapers doesn’t leave enough hours in the day to do the thing you love. Join other busy people and learn techniques to write around work, small children, and other distractions. Develop strategies to cope with sudden complications like sick kiddos and family emergencies. You do have the time to write your next book, you just have to learn how to roll with the punches and make the most of the minutes you have.
Workshop Title: The Glint of Light on Broken Glass: Building Imagery into Your Writing
Facilitator: Young, Mary
Description: Vivid imagery creates a strong sense of place and draws readers into the narrative. In this workshop, a professional nature writer reveals techniques to build vibrant imagery in your writing, whether fiction or nonfiction and writing for adults or children. We’ll discuss three-dimensional description, using the senses, creative word choice and tension within the scene (not from character action), practicing techniques with writing exercises during the session.
Workshop Title: The Resonance of Writing
Facilitator: Cartwright, Trai
Description: Genre, voice, and tone are three craft elements that are intricately interwoven, but many writers aren’t certain how to activate them in their work—or why. This workshop will break them down individually. We’ll examine some skillful masters to learn the power of voice and tone to enthrall readers, as well as its function as the core theme-builder of your book.
Workshop Title: The Short Story: Unlocking All the Doors in the House of Creativity
Facilitator: Maberry, Jonathan
Description: The short story market has never been healthier, and it can not only build your career and increase your professional income, it can also help you stretch as a writer. Short stories offer more creative opportunities than any other form of writing. We’ll discuss the short story structure, tips on finding killer opening hooks and powerful endings, strategies for finding paying markets, and much more.
Workshop Title: Think Like an Agent
Facilitator: Townsend, Suzie
Description: An agent’s perspective on what writers need to do in order to find the right agent fit. This open format workshop blends lecture with relaxed Q&A.
Workshop Title: This is my Circus and These are my Monkeys: Writing Multiple-Character Scenes
Facilitator: Skaggs, Cindy
Description: In this presentation, we will delve into the crowded scene to determine why these scenes increase tension, build suspense, create conflict, and change the direction of the story. Using examples from Ernest Hemingway, Virginia Woolf, JK Rowling, and Jane Austen, we’ll discuss and enumerate the necessary techniques used to craft a successful multiple-character scene so the reader doesn’t get lost and close the book before it’s finished.
Workshop Title: Top 20 Ways to Market Your Book
Facilitator: Letofsky, Polly
Description: Marketing your book can range from $0 to $tratosphere, so how do you know where to best spend your time, energy, and money? In this class we will tell you the most proven and cost-effective ways to get your book into the hands of your target reader.
Workshop Title: Total Immersion: Going Deep
Facilitator: Goff, Chris
Description: In this workshop, Chris Goff will explore some of the ways writers can dig in and mine for that je ne sais quoi that grabs a reader and propels a book onto the bestseller lists. She’ll share some tools, methods and insight, so we can master the art of going DEEP. Please bring five to ten pages of your work-in-progress or finished manuscript (even better) and be prepared to make some changes
Workshop Title: Understanding How the Changes in the Tax Code Effect Your Writing Career
Facilitator: Evans, Jason with Linda M. Evans
Description: Since the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 was past, authors and writers have wondered what the changes in the tax cut will mean for their careers. Whether you are an independent author, traditional writer, or a hybrid, come to our class to find how to navigate it all.
Workshop Title: Unlimited Writing
Facilitator: Maberry, Jonathan
Description: This would be an exploration of how to build a diverse writing career that goes outside of the comfort zone in order to attract new business and broaden skills and opportunities. This is how to make a living as a full-time writer in the post-economic meltdown publishing industry.
Workshop Title: Using Your 9-5 for the Write Life
Facilitator: Hall, Rachel Howzell
Description: Let’s face it: most writers have to keep day jobs. Sometimes, those jobs can diminish your desire to write novels. Don’t let that happen! Author and day-jobber Rachel Howzell Hall will share ways and hacks to help you maintain a career while nurturing the creative spirit.
Workshop Title: What a Character!
Facilitator: McCune, Bonnie
Description: Heroes, role models, villains, crushes, idols, archetypes, and other illusions. Where do characters come from? How do you get to know your characters? Do your characters talk back to you or take over? Which do readers prefer and what do these characters reveal about us as readers and writers? Has there been a change in how women’s fiction presents them? What expectations do they create in readers? Try a character sketch or three and see which ones fit for your work.
Workshop Title: Winning at Writing Strong Female Characters
Facilitator: Rose, Jennifer
Description: We all want to write “Strong Female Characters,” but even that idea has become a stereotype. It’s about more than making them fight, removing all things “girly,” and putting a female in the lead role. Come learn how to move beyond the tropes.
Workshop Title: Word Economy 101
Facilitator: Craft, Rachel Delaney
Description: From scenes to sentences, extraneous words clutter our writing, inflate our word count, and weaken our message. But which darlings should stay and which should be killed in cold blood? In this class, learn how to give purpose to every element of your story, how to strengthen elements by combining them, and how to slim down and power up your writing from the scene level to the sentence level.
Workshop Title: Write Drunk, Edit Sober: Editing
Facilitator: Courtney, Deb
Description: Follow-Up to Previous Night’s Session
Workshop Title: Writing Characters Your Readers Won’t Forget
Facilitator: Litore, Stant
Description: This workshop offers a toolkit for addressing that issue. With practical strategies and abundant examples, this class will help you write unforgettable characters who “come alive” on the page, create compelling dialogue, and chart more breathtaking emotional journeys for your characters.
Workshop Title: Writing the I
Facilitator: Berg, Carol
Description: Techniques for successfully writing in the first person
Workshop Title: Writing the Other: How to Include People Who Aren’t Like You in Your Fiction
Facilitator: Dias, Jason
Description: This presentation will focus on levels of inclusion, examples of each level in popular media, pitfalls to avoid, and resources for achieving full representation. Whether you are writing characters who are a different race from you, different sex, different ability, religion or nationality, getting representation right is an ever-evolving set of challenges. Writers can be criticized for leaving people out and equally for putting them in but getting it wrong. Ultimately, our message will be to do what you can the best you can and always get better. TL;DR: Just do your best.
Workshop Title: YA: What is it? How to Write It? Market It?
Facilitator: Mitchell, Saundra
Description: Young adult novels are among the fastest growing segment of fiction sales, and they command a broad audience from tweens, teens and adults. Learn more about what young adult fiction is and isn’t, the industry standards for young adult novels, and how to find an agent or editor for your young adult work.